


the 1 a.m. question

by museicalitea



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Gen, Impending Separation, Long-Distance Friendship, Pre-Relationship, or rather a prelude to it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-25
Updated: 2017-04-25
Packaged: 2018-10-22 04:17:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,012
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10689591
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/museicalitea/pseuds/museicalitea
Summary: It’s a strange phenomenon: how in this moment, at 1:03 in the morning cast in the shying light of the street lamps, Otabek looks so comfortably rooted in San Francisco, when Leo knows two weeks from now he’ll be gone——gone, and not likely to come back.





	the 1 a.m. question

**Author's Note:**

> "things you said at 1 a.m."
> 
> always pushing that leobeka agenda ♥ and it's tagged as the ship because I have a Timeline for these two and even though it's in its early days here where they're like fifteen/sixteen and everything's still very gen, in this universe it ends in romance trust me on this one

It’s too hot to sleep, tonight, and Leo and Otabek have decamped to the rooftop with their pillows and Leo’s tiny portable speakers. The stars are half-hidden in the wake of the city lights, and despite the hour, there’s still traffic noise drifting into the neighbourhood. Night is never quiet, never lonely out here. Night is never the world holding its breath, as Leo imagines it could be someplace more remote: somewhere where there’s space to blink between the houses, where sound gets swallowed up by the black carpet of midnight wilderness, where you can reach out into the night: and reach, and keep reaching.

Otabek says, when Leo voices this thought to him, that he’s been places like that, only a bit smaller and dirtier and colder. Though the night is temperate, he still pulled Leo’s denim jacket over his pyjamas before they climbed the fire escape ladder up here, and though it’s big on him, he looks at home in it. Maybe it's how he holds himself, poised without a hint of a slouch; but relaxed, for all that.

And it’s a strange phenomenon: how at home Otabek looks, in this one tiny space on a rooftop, where at the rink, in this city, he’s never quite fitted in. It’s strange how in this moment, at 1:03 in the morning cast in the shying light of the street lamps, Otabek finally looks so comfortably rooted in San Francisco, when Leo knows in two weeks he’ll be gone with barely a trace. His own roots here are deep and strong, and nothing could make him leave the way Otabek has done and will do so seamlessly: with his life in a suitcase, ready to fly away and never look back.

That sits uneasy in Leo’s stomach. This thought plagues him, has done for weeks, in small, smoky glances across his mind. More so, lately. Especially so, tonight. He’s known for the two hours he’s been tossing and turning that the heat isn’t the only reason he can’t get to sleep.

Surely, surely Otabek won’t forget him.

“Wonder if midnight in Canada’s as warm as this,” he says, stretching his legs out over the corrugated iron. “Guess it can’t be all polar bears and ice caps in June.”

Otabek huffs out a laugh. “I don’t think they get polar bears in Toronto.”

“I dunno,” Leo says, smiling small where Otabek might not see it in the dark. “It’s _Canada—”_

—like that’s supposed to mean anything but _it’s not here, it’s Canada and it’s so far away, Otabek,_ _I’m really gonna miss you—_

Which he won’t say out loud, because Otabek may have patched up his bleeding feet at the rink and may have helped him pick the music for his older sister’s graduation party and may have seen him cry in the bathroom over his placing in US Nationals, but even through all that, Leo still doesn’t know how to read Otabek. Otabek’s seen Leo’s everything, but he keeps his reserve very well, and Leo’s too cautious to try and break through. He can’t know if Otabek’s really gonna miss him back—

—after all, Otabek is well-practised, it seems, at leaving the whole world behind if he must.

“It’s _Canada—”_

—because if Otabek is leaving him behind, Leo’s gonna make sure he’s at least picked up something from this tiny part of the world to bring on his way. And if that’s not this friendship—there’s no guarantee of that, after all—it had better be something to make him laugh.

Otabek shakes his head, and he does laugh, and Leo’s smile gets a little wider.

“Y’know, if you’re jetlagged once you get over there, you should see what kinds of Arctic wildlife turn up at one in the morning and text me about it.”

“Will you even be awake to see it?”

“It’ll only be ten p.m. over here.”

Otabek hums—low, discontent. “Time difference. Right.”

Leo’s known for weeks. Ever since Otabek told him, he’s been looking at things like that, trying to gauge the distance this move will put between them. And thought it’s nothing compared to if Otabek were going back to Kazakhstan—thirteen hours, and Leo’s stomach dropped at the logistics of keeping their friendship alive when they’d be as far apart in time and space as the Earth could stretch them with orbits that could hardly collide—

It’s still three hours dissonance.

But three hours or thirteen, Leo’s determined to try.

“Hey, it’s not so bad,” he says, lightly. “Besides, you need to let me know how that motorbike thing works out—”

“Of course—”

“—or if you wanna talk about anything, that'd... that'd be nice.”

Leo knows he isn’t asking for Otabek, but for himself.

If he ever needs to reach out—if it’s _Otabek_ he needs to talk to, _Otabek_ he wants to share his successes with, _Otabek Otabek Otabek_ because Otabek is someone Leo doesn’t want to lose—three hours is small enough they might be able to make it work.

A motorbike races by, in the silence Leo leaves between them. The night rises and presses harder, darker on Leo’s skin, and all he can think of is to look away, shut his mouth, not spill out another word about how much he _doesn’t want Otabek to leave—_

“I will.”

Leo blinks. He’s been staring unseeing over the gold-pricked expanse of grey-black horizon, but lands with a jolt back on this dark roof, with the faintest breeze just beginning to cool on his back. And Otabek shuffles around, resting forwards on his hands, and fixes Leo with a look so piercing and so intense Leo can’t make out what he means.

In the shadowy, soft-orange streetlamp glow, Otabek smiles, just a fraction. “I will.”

His voice is sure and solid. It feels like a promise.

Otabek says he will, and in a trembling, bubbling rush, Leo smiles, broad and bright at him; and the night seems a little brighter, as Otabek smiles wider back.

 

 

(Otabek says he will.

Only, he doesn't.)

**Author's Note:**

> usually lurking about on [twitter](https://twitter.com/museicalitea) and [tumblr](http://museicaliteacup.tumblr.com/) if you want to say hi!


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